


In the Heat

by kinslayer



Series: The Valentine Effect [1]
Category: Fallout 4
Genre: F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Mutual Pining, Not Actually Unrequited Love, Unresolved Romantic Tension, Unresolved Sexual Tension, Wire Play, but not really... (for now)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-15
Updated: 2018-09-15
Packaged: 2019-07-12 09:55:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,762
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15992810
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kinslayer/pseuds/kinslayer
Summary: When Nick Valentine needs repairs, he can count on his partner, Val Salvatore, to fix him.But maybe, considering his growing feelings for her, it would be best if he couldn't.With his back to the bricks, Valentine sighed. His right leg had been blown to bits, and there was a chunk of his waist gone with it. He stared at the broken off pieces of his leg laying on the ground.Great.





	In the Heat

“Fuck! Nick! Get away from the-”

His partner’s warning was, ultimately, useless. Valentine turned around just in time to see the incoming missile, and to receive the full force of its blow right on his thigh. The explosion forced him to the ground, and the fact he couldn’t feel his right leg wasn’t a good sign.

“Nick!”

Trying to avoid getting blown up any further, Nick crawled and dragged himself behind a wall while Val dashed without care through the bullets and mutant hounds. With his back to the bricks, Valentine sighed. His right leg had been blown to bits, and there was a chunk of his waist gone with it. He stared at the broken off pieces of his leg laying on the ground.

Great.

This was going to take a damn good while to repair.

“Bit reckless, aren’t you, running around like that?” he teased when Val reached him. “You won’t be as lucky if your leg gets blown up.”

Val stared with wide eyes at the damage, before pulling out her sniper rifle. Crouching besides Valentine, she aimed her rifle to the field of battle. It took a few minutes and some bullets, but she managed to fall the remaining mutants, almost all of them through headshots, too.

Nick never enjoyed the act of killing, but he did enjoy watching Val move.

She dropped her weapon to the ground, and turned her worried gaze to Valentine again.

“Damn it, Nick, how many times have I told you not to just stand around in plain sight like that. You aren’t wearing any armor,” said Val, immediately fussing. “Fuck, Nick. Your leg- God, I’m so sorry-”

“I know it looks bad, but don’t worry,” Nick said, dismissively, “I’ll be fine. I can get my guy in Diamond City to-”

“I’ll to take you to Sanctuary,” Val interrupted, seemingly unaware of what Nick had just said. “I can get some parts and fix this, I promise. Are you in pain?”

Valentine blinked, suddenly catching up with the amount of concern in Val’s voice. “No, I-... I think the pain receptors got blown. Ain’t exactly comfortable, but I’ll be fine. It looks bad, but trust me, I-”

“Oh, Nicky, I’m so sorry, this is my fault, I should have been watching you-”

“Hey, none of that,” Valentine frowned, starting to hate just how worried he was making her feel. “I was the one standing around in my trenchcoat, remember?”

Apparently, that was the wrong thing to say, because Valentina Salvatore, the former mobster who shot up an entire vault for Nick’s sake not even two months earlier, started to tear up.

“Oh, Val, no… I promise, it looks worse than it is.”

“You could have died!” she said, her voice trembling, “you could have died if that missile had hit you like- like in your head! You could have died! God…”

“Hey, hey, I’m here, aren’t I? I’m in one piece. Well, more or less,” said Nick, reaching for her shoulder with his metallic hand. “Don’t think about any ‘could haves’, there’s too many of them out here. I’m alright, okay?”

Val placed her own warm hand over Valentine’s cold one, and seemed to calm down, easing Nick’s mind in turn. When Val pulled back, she wiped her eyes on her gloves, and then put her arm around Nick’s waist, moving him towards her.

“Er… What are you doing?” he asked, though if he were to tell the truth, he didn’t mind being manhandled by her at all.

“I have to take you to Sanctuary, and you can’t walk” she replied, hoisting him up and downright cradling him in her arms. Almost automatically, he put an arm around her shoulders for purchase. “I kept some synth parts there for scrap, and I have some tools. They’ll probably do for repairing you.”

“You, huh, plannin’ to repair me yourself?”

“I’m pretty sure there’s a leg there. Some broken torsos. A few hands, too. And some stuff I don’t really know- ugh, point is,” she stopped, carefully adjusting Nick, “I can fix this. I can fix you.”

Oh, boy. Oh, no, this was bad. This was worse than actually getting blown up.

“You don’t need to do that-,” he said, quickly. The last thing he needed was Val getting her hands on him - those nimble, soft hands to meticulously work him as she so often worked her weapons and machines. He’d be lying if he said he never thought about it, especially when he watched her work.

But thinking about it was one thing.

“Of course I need to-”

“There’s a mechanic in Diamond City,” Valentine said, ignoring the weird feelings in his circuits. He couldn’t put himself in that position, however tempting it was. “When I have, er, troubles I go to him-”

“No offense to this ‘mechanic’, Nick,” Val said, her voice trembling again, “but I need to make sure you’ll be okay. And Sanctuary’s closer. I think.”

“But…”

“But what?” Val asked, stopping suddenly, and looking down at him. “I mean, I…,” she closed her eyes. “Sorry. I’m just worried. I get it if you’d rather someone else repair you. It’s your body, after all, you need someone you trust.”

“That’s not it at all,” Nick was quick to reply. “It’s just…”

She opened her eyes, confused, prompting him.

Damn it, he couldn’t tell her why he didn’t want her hands on him, not when the problem was that he did want her hands on him. He couldn’t tell Val the truth. But he couldn’t lie to her either – it wasn’t in his nature.

Maybe he could settle for a half-truth?

“Just... are you sure you wanna see what I got under the detective getup?” Valentine said after a moment of hesitation. “I’m pretty banged up, even when I’m not ‘sustaining damage.’”

“Oh, Nick, I don’t care about that,” she mumbled, walking again. “Hell, if you’re so ‘banged up’, I can take care of that, too. That is, if you’d like. I… I can be overbearing, I know,” she smiled. “If you want to go to your mechanic, I’ll take you there.”

“I… Thanks.”

“Okay,” Val said, “to Diamond City it is.”

A few steps later of being bridal carried, Nick sighed. This was probably the only chance he’d get to being so… close to her. It was selfish, of course it was. And he shouldn’t. he really shouldn’t. It’d be worse in the long run. But…

Just once, maybe...

“Wait.”

“Yes? Are you alright, Nick?”

“You…”, he started, knowing this was a battle against himself, and that he’d already lost “You can take me to Sanctuary to fix me up.”

“Really? Are you sure?”

“Yes,” Nick smiled sadly, aware he was making a mistake, “you do know your way around machines. And, like you said, Sanctuary is closer.”

Val smiled back, and Valentine felt guilty for it. “Okay.”

 

* * *

 

 

When they got to Sanctuary, Preston was the first to greet them.

“Oh, damn,” he said when they approached, “he looks pretty bad, General. What happened?”

“Mutants and their love of explosives,” Valentine himself answered. “But, like I told her, it looks worse than it actually is.”

“Huh. You lose a leg, but you still talk like it’s nothing,” Preston said. “Must be one of the advantages to being a synth.”

“Hey there, Preston,” Val said. “He only lost the damn leg because he refuses to wear armor.”

“I can’t just ditch my style, doll. It’s my-”

“You can keep your aesthetic and protect yourself, you know?”

“Find me a ‘detective noir’ armor, and then we can talk.”

Val rolled her eyes, mumbled something about “stubborn clockwork dicks”, and hurried to the workshop, leaving Preston to his rounds.

“Hey, Sturges,” she called from the mostly empty room inside the house, “fetch me an armchair, will you?”

She carefully dropped Nick onto the seat when it was given, then left him with a soft “I’ll be back”, and went off to gather the parts and tools she needed.

Which gave Valentine some time alone to regret his decision.

He really should just have let her take him to Diamond City.

He didn’t mind being ‘naked’ in front of James, and let him fix up whatever he needed to while they talked about the latest news and whatnot. James didn’t make him nervous. He’d go there, get repairs, and go home with no trouble.

Val, though? Just the thought of undressing in front of her sent sparks to his wiring, both in the bad and the good ways. And that just wasn’t fair. Not to him, because he’d never get to have what he actually wanted, and not to her, especially, because she deserved way more than being stuck with an old broken up synth who was too stupid not to fall for her.

And Nick just couldn’t have helped it, couldn’t he? No, he just had to invite her for a god damn tour of his entire body.

Hm, maybe he was overthinking it. Maybe it’d be like James. After all, she just wanted to make sure Valentine would be okay. She’d probably be so busy tinkering that she wouldn’t even notice the effect she’d have in him.

Speak of the devil…

“Hey,” said Val, entering the room with her arms full. “Let’s get you whole again, yeah?”

“Sure thing, doll,” Nick chuckled nervously.

“Well, c’mon then,” she said, turning her back to him while picking up her tools. “Lose the pants. And the shirt, too. Well, just- undress. So I can, er, do it. The repairs.”

“Right…”

“Unless,” she turned around, but her eyes were not on him, “you need help…?”

“N-no,” that would be too much. “I can do it.”

“Right,” she said, finally approaching him.

“Right.”

Valentine undressed as fast as he could, eyes conspicuously darting to Val, who, thank God, was looking at the ground.

“Alright,” she said, immediately after Valentine tossed his coat aside. Let’s get to work, yeah?”

“Of course. You, huh, you do what you gotta.”

Upon eyeing him, Val froze in place for a good five seconds before frowning.

“Nick what is this?” she asked, pointing with her wrench at the sign melted down to fix up a hole in the left side of his torso.

“Oh, that,” Valentine mumbled. “My own handiwork. That was before I had someone to do repairs for me.”

“And they never bothered to redo this? Ugh.”

“Hey, I know I’m ugly,” Nick joked, hoping to ease the weird tension that was starting to fall between them, “you don’t have to-”

“Oh, Nick, you’re not ugly. Just… this here?” She pointed again, “this is a shitty job.”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m a synth detective, not a synth engineer.”

Val laughed, bringing a smile to Nick’s face.

“Don’t worry, I’ll fix this up too. Hell, want a paint job while we’re at it? Maybe cover this hole in your chest?”

“Sure, doll,” Nick said, chuckling, “go wild.”

He was sure that, were he human, or at least a Gen 3, he’d have blushed at having just told Val to ‘go wild’ on his body.

What was he doing?

It didn’t seem to bother Valentina, though; she just laughed her beautiful laugh again, and knelt down to take a look at where his leg had been.

The following half hour wasn’t as excruciating as Nick thought it’d be. Of course, Val carefully wiring his body to the new leg distracted him a lot, and her dexterous fingers working the sprockets and gears in place didn’t help either. But it didn’t feel… like he was breaching her trust or privacy, or anything. Hell, he was happy, even.

“C’mon, stretch that leg out for me.”

“Feels good,” Nick said, moving his toes. “Feels even better than the old one. Maybe I should have got hit by a missile a long time ago.”

“Nick, if you want new parts, you can just ask me,” Val rolled her eyes. “You don’t have to go around getting blown up. Now, to the hole in your waist.”

That one was quicker. Just some steel, two screws, and some melted plastic, and it was good as new.

“There we go. Crisis averted,” Nick said, exhaling.

“Yes,” Val said. “Let’s get that ugly sign off of you, now.”

Val stood up, leaned towards Nick, and placed a hand on his chest. She scrutinized the melted blank sign with a frown, until her eyes went up to Nick’s own, her frown faded, and he realized how physically close they were now.

They stared at each other, unblinking.

“Hey, there,” she smiled.

“Hello,” he smiled back.

Val ducked her eyes back to his chest as her cheeks flushed.

Val blushing? That was new. Did he make her uncomfortable?

“I think I can melt some more of the torsos here. Let me just unscrew this…”

She slowly turned the screwdriver, her eyes occasionally darting up to Nick’s face. Hell, he could feel her breath on his face, the warmth of her skin, so close she was to him. When she got up to heat the plastics, Valentine immediately missed the hot air between them.

“How did you get so…” Val suddenly asked when she was back with the hot plate and the bucket, “so…”

“Damaged?” Valentine supplied.

“…Yes,” she said, frowning. “Obviously I’m not trying to offend you or anything, of course not. But… Fuck, Nick, did no one ever take care of you?”

Valentine blinked. “Pardon me?”

“You know,” Val said as she poured the plastic over mold she assembled, “like, you said you have your mechanic, but… All of this looks like the robot-equivalent of having a field doctor’s work. Like you have a bunch on bandages stacked on top of each other. Not to mention the, ah, open wounds,” she pointed at the hole in his chest.

“Heh, well… To be honest, I never really bothered. I went to James when I needed a limb back, or when something really bad happened. Hey, as long as it was all working, I didn’t care.”

Val eyed him sadly as she glued the new mold in.

“You know, that feels an awful lot like you don’t care what happens to you.”

“It’s not like that…” he said, but his protest felt weak even to him.

“Well. I’m decent at this, so guess I’ll take care of you, Nicky,” she leaned, “Can’t let my favorite synth detective down, can I?”

“Trust me, doll,” he smiled, “you never let me down.”

“Smooth, detective,” Val smiled, the curve of her mouth ever closer to him.

Valentine’s gaze moved from her eyes to her lips, as he felt her breath closer and closer to him, and became aware of the heat of her hands on his chest, traveling through his wires and sparkling his circuits. He leaned towards her instinctively, eyes half closed, feeling the air between them growing ever thinner, and then-

“Hey, Salvatore,” came Sturges’ voice from outside, “There’s another leg here if you need it.”

Valentine froze in place, and his eyes opened wide to see Val with the same shocked expression he was wearing.

“...Everything alright in there?”

“Yeah,” Val yelled towards the door, slowly pulling back, but with her hands still on Nick’s chest. “I, huh, I don’t need it. The leg. Thanks, though, Sturges.”

“No problem. Is it okay if I use it though?”

“Yes, Sturges,” she said, the irritation in her voice finally pulling Valentine back to reality.

Damn, had he… Had he really been about to kiss her? What was he thinking?

“Nick?”

It was a real stroke of luck that Sturges had called her when he did, because if he hadn’t, then… it would have ruined everything…

“Hey, Nicky?”

…ruined their partnership, ruined their friendship- hell, it would have been a disaster. He knew he shouldn’t have had agreed to this, it was too much-

“Hey! Nick!”, and fingers snapped on his face.

“Huh?”

“I asked if, huh…,” she said, her fingers gently circling the cracks on Valentine’s torso, “if you still wanted me to… fix that hole in your chest.”

“I…” Oh, he wanted. But that was the problem, wasn’t it? Wanting? “No, it… it’s fine. The important bits are all in place. Another time, maybe? We’ve been here a while.”

“Sure, sure,” she nodded, pulling back slowly, “I’ll let you get dressed. Meet you outside, okay?”

“Of course,” Nick replied, mourning the warmth of her hands, as she picked up her things, and left him with a smile.

It felt so much colder with his clothes on.

**Author's Note:**

> im planning to, HOPEFULLY, IF I AM NOT A LAZY PIECE OF TRASH, add a few more short stories in this series to "document" the relationship of these two, from some plotless mutual pining up until after nick's personal quest, in which he and val confess their FEELINGS and whatnot.
> 
> this is also my attempt to re-learn how to write so i can hopefully continue all my WIPs


End file.
